


ain't so very far from wrong

by reclamation



Category: 3:10 to Yuma (2007)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-29
Updated: 2014-07-29
Packaged: 2019-09-30 18:14:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17228792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reclamation/pseuds/reclamation
Summary: Ben knows he should shake the bounty hunters off his trail, but he just can’t bring himself to care.





	ain't so very far from wrong

**Author's Note:**

> Re-posting some old deleted works.
> 
> Title taken from Gene Autry's "Jingle Jangle Jingle."

This county, like every other, displays bounty posters at the front of the post office that serves for the surrounding towns, all with rough drawings and tempting dollar signs. Centered among these is a poster bearing a sketch of his face. The likeness is obviously modeled on earlier years, during the time he was piecing together the beginnings of a gang, nothing more than an arrogant young man with a cruel smirk and hair that curled around his ears under his soon-to-be trademark round, black hat. The bounty listed under his face, however, is clearly more recent.

Looking at that poster, Ben Wade could not have said how much he still resembled that younger version of himself—although he suspects that the similarities are closer than they feel; more and more, he’s getting wearier and wearier.

It’s been three years, but he still clearly remembers the dull breathing of the three-ten train to Yuma as it thudded steady as a heartbeat while Dan Evan’s own heart failed at the feet of its great wheels. Three years and he still recalls the unforgiving Arizona sun as he boarded that train, eyes stinging with the kicked up dust—before he got off the train again at the next town without so much as spilling a drop of blood.

He thinks Dan would have appreciated that.

Ben supposes that appreciation wouldn’t have lasted long. He hasn’t been shy about giving the railroad as much incentive as he could manage to try to put him in the noose again.

Feeling a spark of mischief, Ben plucks the weather-worn paper with his name and face from the wall, folds it up, and tucks it into a pocket.

 

 

 

“Boss,” Franky greets, and his open admiration is like Charlie come to life again to Ben’s ears. Franky is young yet and doesn’t have that all-driven purpose or sheer wanton cruelty, but the kid is working on it. He’s also solidifying his position as second-in-command, judging by the way he makes it a point to meet Ben at the edge of the town, still atop his horse and vigilant.

Ben tilts his head in response.

“The boys are about ready to be getting on,” Franky continues. “They’re getting antsy, you can imagine, what with everyone at the saloon talking about a posse looking for Ben Wade’s new crew.”

“Yes, I’d imagine so,” Ben answers, but doesn’t change his course from where he’s turned his horse to the town’s center. He’s aiming for whiskey and company tonight—posse or no.

“Boss,” Franky says again, fidgeting with his reins this time. “Word’s around that the bounty on us got raised again after the last stagecoach. Judging by rumor, I reckon there’s already a few vultures on our trail for it.”

Franky reckons right, Ben thinks, or so says the piece of paper in his jacket.

“You’re sounding a mite anxious yourself, Franky,” Ben says, giving him a pointed look. It's meant as a warning, so he pauses to enjoy Franky’s unease. “Why don’t you get back to the boys, tell them we’re meeting up in Douglas the day after tomorrow. Straight shot from there to Mexico. That should settle everyone’s delicate nerves a little.”

Franky twitches away, whole body jerking. He’s goes with only a sullen, “Be careful, boss.”

He’s far too blindly obedient to be a real asset.

Ben thinks wistfully of Charlie’s nagging. As often as he was a burr under Ben’s skin, Charlie had his uses. Without crazy old Charlie skulking in the shadows to watch his back, Ben knows that he should be more wary than he is. Still, it isn’t so much  _Charlie_  that he misses, as much as how easy things had been. Charlie would have been up in his craw, bitching—respectfully—about recklessness. These new recruits will get there, but, like training horses, it takes time.

Time isn’t so much Ben’s friend these days. Ben can’t be much bothered to put the effort into avoiding the hangman now.

As it often does, his mind wanders back to Contention. It’s one of the ways Ben knows that God is a hollow idea; if there were a God, much less a just one, Ben would be the one with upwards of four bullets piercing him through and there’d be one more rancher outside of Bisbee.

 

 

 

At the hotel, the clerk doesn’t look at him askew when he asks for a room, so he figures that he’s got a little while before anyone recognizes him. The man does fumble over the first set of keys he touches before reaching for the farthest.

“Forgot to have that room cleaned out this morning,” the clerk shrugs, holding out the key.

Ben studies him. “I’d prefer the clean one, of course,” he says, and takes the key.

He walks into the shabby second-floor room, tossing his hat carelessly to the bed. There’s a lot of little luxuries that he wants to indulge—clean water and a soft bed at the top of that list, nor would a game of poker or a willing body to share that bed go amiss. The two thousand dollars he took from their last haul sits heavily in his pocket.

But the first order of business is to clean the trail dust from his face and neck. The door falls shut behind him with a thud.

_Click._

Instinct brings Ben’s hand to the Hand of God, but the pistol behind him—held by someone who had been lying in wait behind the door—is too close and at the ready. Ben keeps himself utterly still, still facing away even as he itches to act.

“I suppose you had a deal with the clerk. Impressive guess, figuring I’d stop here.” Ben says, trying for a light tone, “Which are you: sheriff, bounty hunter, or just a good old fashioned vendetta?”

The man makes a thoughtful sound, and his clothing rustles as he shifts. He answers, “Not a law man.”

“If you’re not with the law, that still leaves two options, friend.”

“Bounty hunter’s closest. You’ll have to let me know about the vendetta,” the man says with a chuckle, so slight a sound it’s aborted before it begins. That laugh teases at the edges of Ben’s memory. There’s something about those careful words, and that exact pitch of voice, too. Fingers gently tap his shoulder. “I’ll thank you not to shoot me if I let you turn around.”

Ben nods, already considering—and discarding—the possibility. The hand guides him around, slow and sure against his coat.

The air is punched right out of him at the sight before him: Dan Evans.

A handful of new scars litter his face and neck, some old enough to be from their two day trip and a few that look fresher, but it’s Dan sure as anything.

“You look pretty good for a ghost, Dan,” Ben manages to say, cursing the hitch in his words. “Should’ve known you’re too stubborn to die.”

Ben’s hand still rests on the familiar grip of the Hand; Dan pays no heed as he holsters his own revolver, not looking the least worried. In fact, Dan looks downright pleased with himself.

“Bounty hunter, you said? Hope you know I won’t be walking quite so easy to a train this time.”

Again, Dan laughs, waves him off. “Not planning on any trains at the moment.”

Ben regards him again, looking for a lie and finding nothing except the crinkle of amusement around Dan’s eyes and the still-pleased turn of his lips. Dan is dressed better than Ben would expect—rancher’s patched-up clothing exchanged for newer, practical items. There’s something different about his stance, too, like he’s standing easier on the one leg. Dan appears at ease. It takes a moment for Ben realizes that it’s pride that sits so well on Dan. He looks like a man who knows his place in the world rather than one scrabbling for an existence.

Ben takes his palm from the Hand and clasps Dan on the shoulder instead. He says, “Well, I think this reunion calls for whiskey while we catch up, seeing as the last time I saw you, you were dead.”

Dan’s eyes cool a little, and he clasps his hand around Ben’s forearm. “Already done.”

Ben raises an inquiring eyebrow.

Dan shrugs, looking unsure for the first time in their entire exchange. “I figured we’d either need it for talking or it wouldn’t hurt anything to help ‘em find my body quicker.”

“One or the other,” Ben supplies. Dan shrugs. “I’m not entirely sure if that’s more romantic or pragmatic.”

“I’ve been tracking you since you skirted around Contention,” Dan says, an admission that flushes his cheeks with honesty or embarrassment.

Surprise catches him. He should have noticed, and maybe that’s a sign he’d been a little too reliant on Campos and Charlie’s sharp eyes.

“That’s quite a few miles back,” Ben says.

Dan nods again, unrepentant.

A knock at the door unsettles the stillness that’s fallen over them. Dan brushes past him to accept the whiskey from a serving girl, subtly handing over a coin for gratuity. Ben strips out of his coat, laying it along with his hat at the wardrobe, before settling back in the bed. There’s only one chair, and he figures that even under this relaxed man hides the straight-backed rancher he knew briefly—Dan would prefer the chair.

“Done well for yourself, then?” Ben gestures towards the door. Dan flushes again, which Ben rather likes. He continues, “Bounty hunting ain’t much better than the Pinkertons though, I’ve gotta tell you. Can’t say I’m fond of either.”

Dan shuffles a bit, pushing the chair and table close to Ben so that both can reach without strain. Dan goes about the task with total fixation, adjusting the table so that it sits just so and then placing the bottle and glasses on it precisely. He pours the glasses in the same careful silence. Ben’s thinking he won’t get an answer when Dan settles back and says, “I needed something to do after ranching. And I seem to’ve acquired a reputation.”

“Did you finally get that respect you deserved, Dan? For doing what all them Pinkertons and railroad men couldn’t?”

Dan shuffles again, tossing back the shot of whiskey without meeting Ben’s scrutiny. Ben, however, is riveted to those downcast eyes, incapable of tearing his own from the sight before him.

“It’s not bad work. Most outlaws are a little easier than you.”

Ben takes his own glass, toasts it towards Dan with only a little mocking in the gesture. “I’m betting Alice loves your new vocation.”

Dan pauses, settling his glass on the table with exaggerated care, but his voice and look is unwavering when he says, “She left.”

Ben has a whole lot of wrong things to say to that and not a single right thing, so he takes up the bottle and refills their glasses.

Dan looks at the whiskey like it might have the answer to the questions Ben isn’t asking.

“You were right when you said debt is hard on a marriage. Alice was good to suffer through it with me. She faced down Hollander in town, while I was gone,” Dan pauses, sucking in a tattered breath. Ben doesn’t have to ask where Dan was, knowing the answer would be somewhere between Bisbee and Contention. “He’d burned down a home a few miles out from us. Same situation—except no one checked to make sure it was empty. It was before the rain came so everything was dry as dust. The whole thing went up like tinder with the kids inside. Alice stared that bastard down in the town square, laying his sins out one by one.”

“That was a brave thing to do,” Ben says. He means ‘stupid,’ but it took a healthy amount of courage, too.

Dan grimaces like he knows. “Lucky for Alice, Hollander didn’t get much time to respond, apparently. Butterfield showed up a day later with the thousand dollars he promised, and he paid Hollander off with just about the whole town witnessing.”

“Why’d she leave? You got me delivered me to my train, collected your thousand dollars, and managed to rise again from the dead like Lazarus. What more could a lady ask for?”

“I won’t hear a word against her,” Dan warns, fiercely protective. The effect is only slightly diminished by how his gaze falters after, pain flickering bright and vulnerable. “We’d have been all right, if it were only that. We could’ve turned it around if the cough hadn’t gotten Mark.” His voice wavers, “I wasn’t able to bury him myself. She never blamed me for that.”

The story is abbreviated, Ben has no doubt, but it’s almost more words than he’s ever heard out of Dan in a single sitting before. Ben nudges the whiskey towards Dan, and Dan takes it. Ben, for his part, doesn't question him further. He doesn’t need to; he can imagine the scene clearly enough to draw it himself: Dan clinging to life by sheer force of will in some dismal room while Alice and Will dig a too-small grave and thinking about the larger one they expect to dig shortly after.

“Sorry to hear that, Dan,” Ben says, startled by his own sincerity. “He seemed like a good boy.”

“He was.” Dan looks up again, fingers nudging the full shot glass side to side. “That’s all of it. We sold the ranch after all, Alice started up her own shop in Bisbee, and I moved on.”

“That’s quite a story,” Ben says, downing another shot. “Ain’t you gonna ask me for mine?”

Dan laughs and shakes his head. He says, “I don’t expect I have to, seeing as you’re still a favorite in the papers. Got a new gang—I’ve seen ‘em myself following you the past day—and they say you’ve twice again the robberies.”

Ben allows himself a little pride in his grin, “I promise you the story is so much more interesting when I tell it. They leave out all the best bits.”

“I bet,” Dan says, wryly.

“Pardon me for asking, but if you’re not here to bring me to justice ‘at the moment,’ then why  _did_  you come?”

Ben knows he’s looking hard at Dan, likely giving away too many of his thoughts. Even if he only knew him for a handful of fairly eventful days, he’s long admired the idiot rancher. He’s been unnaturally intrigued since the moment he realized Dan had placed himself as bait, feigning an interest in being bought off for less than fifteen dollars, in the Bisbee saloon.

Dan looks hard right back at him. The expression he wears is peculiar, raw and open and unreadable. “I volunteered.”

“Come again?”

“Bounty hunters talk to each other,” Dan explains. “A sheriff wanted to form up a posse to bring you in. They weren’t much bothered about the ‘dead or alive’ part. I said I’d scout things out, take lead.”

Ben feels worry trawl through him—not at all helped by the fresh remembrance of Dan’s ability at laying traps for him particularly—and it doesn’t help that the whiskey is starting to scatter his thoughts. He says, “I don’t see a posse with you.”

“Seven of them rode out of Bisbee a week back with me. I sent them the wrong way around Contention.”

“Once you found me.” Ben looks at him, agog. “Why would you go do a thing like that?”

Dan shrugs, “I never intended to lead them to you.”

Ben thinks he’s starting to get the picture. He hopes to heaven above that he’s got it right.

“You used to be hell-bent on bringing me in, Dan, whatever happened? Stop caring about all those lives on my hands?”

“I was on the ground, more than half way to dead, and you got on that train. It makes me feel a little kindly towards you, doing right for Alice and Will.”

Ben scoffs, “You sound as struck as your boy did. I got off that train again a few miles down the track.”

Dan stare bores into him, knowing. “You put yourself on it first.”

“I’m gonna wash up,” Ben says, and tries not to feel like this time it’s him avoiding Dan’s eyes.

 

 

 

Between the Arizona summer and the burn of whiskey, his face is feverishly hot. The pitcher of lukewarm water cleans off the worst of the road and cools his skin. He steps back out of the bathroom to find himself at Dan’s back and Dan stepping towards the door.

“I can't understand you, Dan Evans,” Ben says. “The last time we met, you were a rancher willing to lay down your life to see me off to my execution. Now you’re a self-professed bounty hunter with a bounty worth several thousand dollars in your lap, but you’re just gonna let me disappear.”

Dan stills, but doesn’t turn. “Bringing you in once was trouble enough, Wade.”

“Why, Dan, did you come all this way to warn me after all?” He doesn't mean it seriously, though the words fall between them too heavy.

Dan doesn’t answer, he doesn’t move. His shoulders hitch up tensely.

It’s as good as a confession for Ben. It’s as good as permission.

He sidles up behind Dan, pressing the heel of his hand against Dan’s neck so that his fingers brush past his ear to lie against the bolt of his jaw. He brings his mouth low and close to that space, so that his breath ruffles through Dan’s hair. “If sinful men entice you,” he recites, “do not give into them.”

“Wade,” Dan says, voice rough, “You better not be rattling off verses, or so help me.”

“Proverbs 1:10,” Ben answers, not even bothering to try to hide his delight. Then he uses his leverage to angle Dan backwards for an awkward kiss.

Dan’s beard rasps against his as Ben’s hand lowers to cup the line of his jaw so he can tilt Dan’s head as he likes. Dan responds greedily against his lips. Dan’s mouth is hot and open and unhesitant, carrying nothing of the reticence, shyness, or misplaced guilt that Ben might have expected. Dan twists in his grip until they’re facing each other without so much as breaking contact. Ben gasps a little as Dan jostles against him, alternately pressing chest-to-chest and then hip-to-hip. Dan’s hands fumble over his torso—first at the buttons of his waistcoat and then inside to slide against his shirt along his sides.

He has never understood celibacy—never even tried—but it’s not often Ben feels urgency like he does now. He’s straining against his trousers and pushing back into Dan in kind. When Ben coaxes Dan towards the bed gently, Dan follows his guidance eagerly. They manage to strip each other out of most their remaining clothing—pistol belts, waistcoats, and shirts—with frenzied hands before Dan’s knees hit the bed and they tumble backwards clumsily.

Ben’s black heart thanks every circumstance that had to pass to bring Dan to this state of hungry hands and mouth, including the absent wife and buried child.

“You’ve become a whole lot more pliable in your second life,” Ben notes, and bends his head to scrape his teeth along the side of Dan’s neck before going lower to suck dark marks into the skin of his chest and stomach alongside each of the scars Charlie left on him with those deadly Schofields. Each raised pucker of white-hued tissue is ragged—one, two, three, four shots that would have killed anyone less stubborn than Dan Evans. Under one particular scar, Dan’s heart thumps fast and hopeful.

“The world’s been more accommodating to me,” Dan says, like it’s an answer.

Ben laughs and sets about shucking off the last of Dan’s clothing.

“So long as you’re willing to accommodate _me_ ,” Ben murmurs into the sharp cut of Dan’s hip.

Dan hisses, arching up towards Ben’s mouth. The movement causes the trousers in Ben’s hand to catch a little at Dan’s prosthetic, but Dan doesn’t seem to notice and Ben makes sure not to look like he minds. It’s only when he removes the prosthetic completely and sets it aside that Dan glares down at him. There’s nothing unexpected—only the blunt, prematurely ending limb, rubbed a little raw from the false leg. Ben kisses the knee apologetically if only to smooth out Dan’s stormy expression.

“How long’s it been since someone’s put their mouth here?” Ben asks, pressing his lips against the vulnerable flesh of Dan’s inner thigh. Dan groans under him, practically squirming. Ben grins, moving his lips further up to tease at the base of Dan’s cock. “How 'bout here?”

He licks his lips, watching as Ben’s eyes trail the movement.

“Damnit, Wade,” Ben gasps, voice gratifyingly rough, “Either get to it or—!”

Ben circles one palm around Dan’s cock. Then he takes the rest into his mouth, forestalling any more of Dan’s complaints. Rough fingers dig into his neck. Ben hollows his cheeks out and sucks until Dan is a mess beneath him. Those fingers inch up until they grasp at his hair tightly. He experiments by flicking his tongue here and there, just to appreciate the sounds Dan makes, the way those long fingers become desperate against his skin.

Ben aches for  _everything_. Desire thrums through his veins and fills his mind with myriad fantasies.

He only breaks away to ask, “What d’you want, Dan?”

Dan inches his hips upwards. That’s not the answer Ben’s looking for.

“D’you want my mouth?” Ben punctuates the question with a lewd lick that leaves Dan writhing. “I think, perhaps, you might be wanting something more?”

Dan hands spasm against his scalp at the suggestion. He nods his head, more frantic than Ben’s ever seen him.

“Say it,” Ben orders, tone soft.

“More,” Dan complies, breathlessly.

Ben takes his teeth to the sensitive flesh at the junction of thigh and torso. “That won’t do. Try again, except maybe more descriptive like.”

Dan snarls beneath him, pushing up but not really trying to get out from under him. Ben keeps him in place with a gentle hand and well-applied tongue.

“So what’ll it be?”

Dan claws at his back, fingertips sliding along sweaty skin in the sweltering Arizona heat. “I want it all, Wade. Do it.”

Ben hums, considering. His own cock is insistent, and he supposes that’s as good as Dan can manage for now. Next time he can build up the patience to tease Dan until that strict mouth forms the words ‘cock’ or ‘fuck me’—and there’s a thought that strikes Ben straight to the core.

“My cock is going to be in your ass in a second here, I think you can call me ‘Ben,’” he offers as crudely as he can, hoping to cause a blush.

Dan disappoints, instead meeting his eyes steadily. He says, “Less talking, more doing.”

“That’s the plan, Dan—” Ben begins.

“Forgot you were so damn chatty,” Dan interrupts, cutting him off with a sharp tug at his hair and keeping his hold as he continues to drag Ben up the bed. Dan’s hands only give up their advantage when he can grab at Ben’s belt loops to reel Ben back in for a sloppy kiss. Tongue and lips ply across and into Ben’s mouth haphazardly, exploring for their own sake rather than his. Dan’s fingers work at Ben’s remaining buttons until Dan can push both pants and underclothes down to his satisfaction. Ben drinks in the enthusiasm, near to dizzy with it. Dan breaks away to nip at the corner of his jaw, grabbing at Ben’s trousers again impatiently for emphasis, “Off.”

There’s not a whole lot of souls brave or stupid enough to tell Ben Wade what to do. The command fans the kindling of want in his belly straight into  _need_.

It only takes a floundering second to discard the lot and bear down so that skin meets skin. Ben gasps at the sensation, and he feels Dan grin into the skin of his throat.

“I wasn’t expecting company, so spit’s gonna have to do,” Ben warns. Dan doesn’t lose any of his smugness. He answers by raising his hips to clash against Ben’s, Dan’s sharp bones knocking uncomfortably against his flesh. Ben drives them back down with a hand. “Open up and sit still.”

Confusion passes over Dan’s face, but only briefly. Then he spreads his thighs wide.

Ben wants to spout off an easy verse to prod at Dan’s irritation and recall the husk of his rough voice; he can think of none that would suffice to describe exactly how decadent Dan looks, offered up to his view, and none that fully encompasses the perfect sin of what’s between them.

He contents himself with moving down the bed to hook Dan’s good leg over his shoulder. Dan watches him intently, eyes impossibly dark as Ben rubs the pad of a finger over him before pressing in a bit. Discomfort doesn’t even dim Dan’s intense regard, which is more a testament to Dan’s tolerance than anything else without even spit to ease the way.

Ben withdraws the finger, makes a show of wetting it in his mouth, and returns it to its task.

Dan meets the intrusion without hesitance, the muscles there giving in readily. Ben mouths the place above Dan’s knee in praise. He does another finger, twisting both until Dan is gasping.

A cold trickle of sweat runs from the nape of Ben’s neck along the length of his back.

“Dan,” Ben says. He meant to say something else.

Dan swallows a noise. He gulps a breath, another. He asks, “That all you got, Ben?”

No man could ignore that challenge, Ben thinks. He does what he can to wet the head of his cock and pushes in with as much restraint as he can muster. Stretched and spine arched, Dan cinches his hands into the sheets and groans loudly.

Ben pulls up the other leg to his opposite shoulder, selfishly glad Dan can get some purchase with the crook of that knee still.

Then he takes Dan, pistoning his hips into him hard and relentless. Even too dry and too hot and downright uncomfortable, it is too good to last very long.

Afterwards, he allows Dan’s legs to fall to the mattress and finishes the job he started earlier with his mouth. He swallows Dan’s release and drinks up how broken open Dan looks in the moment.

 

 

 

Dan dresses methodically.

“The posse,” he says, looking at the buttons of his shirt as he does them up. “They won’t be put off forever.”

Ben stays where he is, happy to still laze about bare-assed in the bed and enjoy the satisfaction rooting through his bones. “There’s always a posse. Don’t worry your pretty head about me.”

Dan slants a look at him then, annoyance plain. When Dan stares longer, Ben sighs and fishes for his coat, bringing out the poster. He thrusts it at Dan carelessly. “I’ve been at this a few years longer than you’ve been hunting rotten souls such as myself. I’ll be back to terrorizing the railroad before your posse even knows I was here.”

Dan takes the paper, unfolding and flattening it carefully against his thigh. Already Ben wants to touch him there again, to run his mouth against those hidden corded muscles.

A quiet minute passes and Dan is still looking at the sheet closely. Ben wants to ask so many things. He wants to ask Dan to come along. He wants so badly that it's nearly a physical thing, struggling in his throat. He knows well that he’d make all sorts of promises he couldn’t keep to string Dan along day by day until he grew into a wanted man and couldn’t leave Ben’s side. Ben doesn't ask; he bites down on his tongue, having collected enough rejections from Dan for one lifetime, and unable to bear another on this particular day.

Finally, Dan folds up the poster, fingers conscientiously following the old creases. He offers it back, but Ben doesn’t reach for it.

“Keep it, Lazarus,” Ben says, trying on a crooked smile. “Consider it a memento.”

Dan frowns. He says, “This isn’t the end of it.”

“Could be,” Ben allows, still reigning in his rebellious tongue that wants to tell Dan about Douglas and all those promises.

Dan leaves without fanfare. He doesn’t even so much as lay a kiss to Ben’s forehead, much less his mouth. In fact, Dan goes without another word, the bounty poster in his pocket and his face is wrinkled in thought.

 

 

 

Unknown to either of them, seven riders enter town.


End file.
